Went shopping this week at a Salvage Yard. These were there. Off a loco or stationary?

Side view past the wheel pile.

Someone must need that archbar truck in the second picture?
M. Nix

Please correct me if i’m wrong, but those seem to be stationary boilers. Note the two firebox doors instead of one “Butterfly” door in the center. I believe that most, if not all locomotive boilers had one large door for the firebox.

Mechanically operated firedoors came into use around 1915-1920. Plenty of locomotives never had them. And double firedoors were commonly used on wide fireboxes (anthracite/culm burners).

These are certainly locomotive-style boilers, with a very probable PRR pedigree or connection.

Howard P.

Oh, Howard. Now you've done it.

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Marine boilers? Just because they were found in a scrapyard with railroad wheels and trucks does not mean they are rail related. Heavy scrap is heavy scrap-

I was going to suggest the same thing - marine or stationary just by looking at the back of the fire box and the orientation of the two doors. May not even be coal fired. This from a diesel guy....

Here is a link to a short thread that may also discuss these boilers.

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=24884&hilit=belpaire

I recall another thread with photos, but cannot easily find it using the search tool. I think the determination was these were marine boilers or another industrial use.

Is this the Kovalchik yard?

Wesley

Wesp,

Yes at Kovalchick’s

If they're at Kovalchick's then the person to ask would be Joe K himself; I'll guarantee the man knows where every pound of metal in his yard came from.

Alan Maples

I have looked over those two boilers at length and they certainly are stationary boilers. I have no idea where they came from though.

The area that the business is in used to be the heart of the paper industry in PA, as well as the chemical industry. There were a lot of plants that converted hemlock into acid for tanning. Over the years these business' have gone by the wayside, and the Kovalchik's have scrapped a lot of plants, including inter plant narrow gauge rail equipment, as well as aforementioned power plants

Belpaire firebox boilers were originally installed at the Metropolitan Water Works pumping station in Chestnut Hill, MA, part of Boston's water supply system. They were part of the original construction of 1888. They were later replaced with vertical boilers in the 1920's.


Three of the steam pumps are still there in a museum which can be visited by appointment. They are housed in a beautiful Richardsonian building and include a massive 3 cylinder compound vertical engine and a unique 3 cylinder compound engine with rocker arms to transfer the power from the cylinders to the pumps. http://www.waterworksmuseum.org

Unfortunately they are now static displays, but are still awesome in their Victorian setting.